Brian Hayes (Fine Gael)

I am always stung for money there. However, last year while on holiday, I met another Dubliner who also takes his family there every year. He made the point to me that while he did not mind paying for things, he hated being screwed. Many people who holiday in Ireland feel they are screwed on a regular basis, whether it is eating out, the cost of accommodation or the jacked-up prices during the summer months for tourist attractions. This is the perception and while one might argue whether it is reality, it is as far as the product consumer is concerned. We must concentrate on this.

Senator Norris also made a valid point. The vast majority of people who work in the hotel industry do not come from Ireland but are from the new EU accession states or are here because they have work visas and are paid very small sums of money. Guests pay enormous sums of money for this product on a nightly basis, but as far as the people who actually make the beds and prepare the food are concerned, historically the catering and tourist industries are one of the worst payers in the country. Someone is making a substantial killing from this and it is certainly not the people who work in the hotel industry.

I take this opportunity to thank people from other countries who have made the Irish tourist industry such a success in recent years. In years gone by, many students or younger people used to take up those jobs. However, they no longer do this because, as Senator Morrissey has noted, such jobs do not pay massive sums of money. We should thank people who have come to this country for all kinds of reasons — Latvians, Estonians or people from the other accession states — and work in our tourism and catering industries doing so much to promote Irish tourism. This point must be made.

It is essential that we do much more to stimulate interest in the UK market if we are serious about delivering this product and getting more people to visit Ireland. I understand that the UK market cumulatively amounts to €2 billion worth of investment in terms of the Irish tourism industry every year, yet I understand that the amount we spend on marketing in the UK is pathetic compared with the amount of trade we receive from there. There is an enormous untapped market in the UK in terms of weekend products, golfing products and week-long holidays and we need to market these. A key aspect is the increase in low fares airlines flying to Ireland, particularly to destinations outside Dublin.

I wish to do everything in my power to support the Irish tourism industry. I enjoy taking holidays in Ireland every year but we must drive down prices acriss the board so that the perception of Ireland as an expensive country is challenged and met by a range of strategies to drive down prices in the tourism industry. The reason why many people from North America are not coming to Ireland is primarily due to the change in the relationship between the dollar and the euro. However, we were too reliant on the North American market for many years. Tourists from North America were big spenders who stayed in the top hotels and we made enormous sums of money from that aspect of the industry. We may well have to venture abroad and look to new markets. One market that we must focus is the UK and I would ask the Minister to take that on board.